The issue of teen prison rape is real.
Ted Roelofs of the Bridge magazine writes in the first of a two-part series:
One said he was raped in a shower. Another said he was tied down by a bunkmate and sodomized. Still others said they were forced into oral sex, or had their genitals squeezed by prison guards, male and female.
They were inmates thrown into Michigan prisons at 17 or even younger, a practice with predictable risks. Once inside, they said they were sexually taunted by adult prisoners and guards and raped by men far older and more powerful than themselves. One noted that when his cellmate was done with him, he was handed over to other prisoners for a bag of beef sticks and chips. When the teenagers reported attacks, they said prison guards laughed at their torment, or did nothing.
Bridge has obtained exclusive access to testimony from all seven teenage inmates originally named in a lawsuit against the Michigan Department of Corrections. Their testimony, outlined in raw video depositions, chronicles dozens of assaults across 10 Michigan prisons, nearly a decade after state prison officials vowed to protect young inmates from sexual assault.
The allegations, if true, raise serious questions about the competence of state corrections officials under multiple Michigan governors. They also raise the prospect of another large payout by a state that, just six years ago, agreed to pay $100 million to settle a case involving the sexual assault of female inmates by prison guards.
